He Rode With Charlie Kirk to the Hospital. One Year Later, The Full Story | Ep. 58 w/ Frank Turek

Frank Turek was Charlie's friend and mentor. They shared one mission: to bring the gospel to college students. One year ago today, Frank was standing next to Charlie Kirk on the campus of Utah Valley University when he was murdered. He rode with Charlie's body to the hospital. He has spent the year since defending Erika Kirk, TPUSA, and his own name against a flood of conspiracy theories — chiefly from Candace Owens.

In this conversation, Frank returns to the show to talk through the last conversation he had with Charlie two nights before he died, why he's more convinced than ever of the reality of evil and demonic activity, and what actually happened in the vehicle on the way to the hospital — including why eyewitness discrepancies aren't evidence of a cover-up. He also opens up about Erika Kirk's grief and leadership of TPUSA, what she told him in the hospital hallway, and why forgiveness and civil justice aren't in conflict — plus what Christians get wrong about "turning the other cheek."

Frank and Jeremy also get into Charlie's private frustration with certain donors over Israel and why it was never what people now claim, Tucker Carlson and antisemitism, and a full, plain explanation of the Christian gospel — because too many Christian words have stopped meaning anything to the people who use them.

They take on the conspiracy industry that's grown up around the assassination: why Candace Owens' "receipts" are exactly the kind of eyewitness discrepancies a cold-case detective would expect to find, why the exploding-mic theory would require thousands of people to be in on it, and why the defense in the Tyler Robinson pretrial hearings isn't disputing any of it. Plus: whether Erika Kirk can forgive her husband's killer and still pursue the death penalty, what Romans 13 actually says about government and vengeance, why pastors abandoned the public square — and what Charlie's "Blessed are the peacemakers" moment taught a man twice his age.

Frank Turek is the founder of CrossExamined.org and co-author (with Norman Geisler) of "I Don't Have Enough Faith to Be an Atheist," now in a new 22nd-anniversary edition releasing this October. His new book, "The War on Reality" (co-authored with Phoenix Hayes), is out now and includes a foreword by Erika Kirk.

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Jeremy's fantasy series The Pendragon Cycle: Rise of the Merlin is streaming now on Amazon Prime: https://www.amazon.com/gp/video/detail/B0HFH7J5N3

0:00 Cold Open: "The Last Person I Think of Before Bed Is Charlie"

9:26 The Demonic Is No Longer an Abstraction

20:17 The Hospital Hallway: Erika's First Words

25:09 Meeting Erika Kirk — And Knowing It Was All Lies

32:04 The CPR "Receipt" That Proves Nothing